PhD Program

The doctoral program emphasizes the early involvement of all students in research, so students entering the PhD program should be prepared to work actively to define their research interests in consultation with faculty and to declare their area of specialization early in their studies. It is always possible to change specialization, although this may prolong the time needed to complete the program. Bear in mind that it is increasingly critical for those aiming for an academic or industry career to begin building a (CV) at an early stage of the doctoral program. This means not only constructing the CV, or academic resume, according to the standard template, but also producing professional-level research products that you can include on that CV. These products range from conference presentations and posters to articles. The sooner you can define your research program, the more quickly you can begin to build your CV.

Professional Networking

Graduate students are encouraged to create profiles on the academic research-sharing websites  and . In addition, they are encouraged to join a professional organization like the  (LSA). The LSA sponsors biennial month-long summer schools in linguistics at major universities, as well as a large professional meeting that attracts over 1,000 linguists to a major US city each January. All LSA members are welcome to submit abstracts for talks at the annual meeting. The annual meeting is also a major site for academic interviews; the LSA provides academic and industry job listings to members on its website. Graduate students are also encouraged to join major linguistic online communities like the .